Skip to main content
Main

Eggplant

Eggplant slices are salted, battered, fried, or boiled and mashed, then baked with crackers.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓
Eggplant

Why it works: Eggplant and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,123 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Eggplant

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the eggplant

  1. Peel and cut the eggplant into 3 slices.

  2. Sprinkle with coarse sea salt and black pepper, then let drain on a tilted plate for 45 minutes.

Fry the battered slices

  1. Make a light batter with the egg, flour, and a little water.

  2. Dip the eggplant slices into the batter and fry in butter or lard until golden.

  3. Alternatively, peel the eggplant, boil until tender, then drain and mash.

  4. Season the mash with butter, salt, and pepper to taste.

Bake and serve

  1. Place the mixture in a shallow baking dish and top with a thick layer of crushed crackers.

  2. Bake in a moderate oven (350°F / 175°C) for 30 minutes.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Eggplant + peppertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,123 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  2. Eggplant + flourtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together371 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Eggplant
Forms the main body of the dish, becoming soft and tender when cooked.
Egg
Binds the batter so it coats the eggplant and sets when fried.
Flour
Thickens the batter so it clings to the eggplant slices.
Butter or lard
Fries the coating to golden brown and adds richness.

The step that matters

Draining the eggplant. Salting and draining pulls out excess moisture, so the slices fry crisp rather than soggy and the batter sticks instead of sliding off.

Swap the eggplant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pepper, egg, flour, butter):

  1. Chivefits better
  2. Shallotfits better
  3. Asparagusfits better
  4. Eggplantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, egg, flour, butter. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

You might also like

Tomato SoupTomato Soup526 recipesBrown BreadBrown Bread461 recipesMutton BrothMutton Broth292 recipesYorkshire PuddingYorkshire Pudding264 recipes